Little Bailey Rocha touched many people in her short life. Her famous saying “Never Give Up” was uttered so many times to those she loved and those words became a way of life for her until her tired little body could do no more.

One person that she touched was Shaun Felber of Newman who owns a Farmers Insurance Agency.

It seems that Farmers Insurance (Corporate) offers a community program that contributes funds to a civic organization of the agent’s choice. The agent must show that the organization is non-profit and provides a benefit to the community. TOSCA was Shaun’s organization of choice and Bailey was going to be his role model.

Bailey’s words rang in Shaun’s mind as he spent countless hours sending newspaper articles, photos, website updates and more to show what kind of impact Bailey had on our community. In addition, he sent them information about TOSCA and its role in improving the level of education for Newman graduates. In its fourteen years of existence, TOSCA has awarded over $873,000 – Shaun and his brother Scott were both recipients of TOSCA scholarships.

Farmer’s Insurance certainly got the message and they were impressed. So impressed, that they proudly sent Shaun a check in the amount of $1,000 to forward on to TOSCA in memory of Bailey.

Shaun’s work continues as he is trying to make this an annual scholarship in Bailey’s name.

Newman, TOSCA and Shaun’s family should all be proud – what a wonderful way to honor someone who touched so many. Bailey’s words “Never Give Up” can ring true for all of the graduates going off to college who think that they will never make it. You will, and Bailey will be there with you!!

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Virgil Bettencourt of Newman recently came into our Newman office with a “GREAT” find. An original copy of The West Side Index – Women’s Edition, dated Tuesday, March 24, 1914. Selfish as he is (just kidding Virgil) he didn’t leave me the original copy – he was going to give that to the museum – but he did allow me to make a copy of the publication for our records.

The edition focused on The Woman’s Improvement Club of Newman which was founded in April 1908 by Mrs. A. C. Walden who also served as President. Mrs. Emil Meier was Vice-President, Secretary was Mrs. C.E. Mays and Treasurer was Mrs. T. G. Yancey.

The focus of the publication was the community of Newman and it’s many assets of the time: the dairies, the beautiful homes, the bountiful crops and the splendid schools. Even then, the message was that no community can be truly progressive unless adequate provisions are made for the education of the young men and women of the community. No truer words were ever spoken in my opinion – those same words are pertinent today as well.

As of 1914, Yancey Lumber had been in business for 46 years and a full page advertisement boasted lumber yards in Newman, Crows Landing and Patterson. First National Bank, The Simon Newman Company and Sperry Flour also had prime advertising space.

Included in the informative publication was articles about Gustine, Los Banos and Western Merced.

A small article reported that Mrs. Mathilde Bambauer of Volta was the only woman real estate agent in this part of the county and reported that her first year of sales totaled more than $50,000. Well times certainly have changed!

The copy of the edition sits proudly in my office, but if you would like to stop by and look through it, you are certainly more than welcome to do so.

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Fighting fire with fire – a group of West Side Republican voters recently signed and sent a letter to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger requesting a meeting with him to discuss the development of the Crows Landing Naval Base.

The group states the obvious objections to the project: increased traffic, concern for water supply and sewage treatment facilities and other infrastructure. What is new in this document is the statement that Jerry Kamilos, of West Park, is the number two donor to the governor’s relection campaign fund – a stated amount of over $300,000 – which is no drop in the bucket for any election campaign. Rightly so, the group states that money talks – unfortunately in politics it does do that!

Interestingly enough, the group also states in their letter that one of the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors (not Jim DeMartini) refuses to meet with any farmer or group against the development plan until after the April vote that will grant or deny West Park’s plan.

A copy of the letter was circulated to Senator Jeff Denham, Assemblyman Greg Aghazarian, members of the Stanislaus County Board of Supervisors, The Turlock Journal, the Modesto Bee, the Patterson Irrigator and this paper.

Signatures of West Side Republican voters include, Burta Herger, Dean Hoak, Carolyn Herr, Carol Nunes, Richard Crow, Danielle Darc, Philip Breaker, Fritz Schale, Leo Halseth, Ramona Casado, Kenny Buehner, Dorothy Johnson, George Klopping, Eloise Barsamian, Elwood and Joland Schut and Virginia Usadel.

You can be sure that things will be getting interesting over the next few months as the April deadline for the supervisors vote approaches. West Park has run an aggressive informational campaign showing the advantages to the project while those in opposition continue to bring forth information of concern and for the most part have kept their opposition at a local level – that is until now.

Trust me, it will get even more interesting!

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